Botanic Gardens is a public garden in

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...

, Northern Ireland. Occupying of south Belfast, the gardens are popular with office workers, students and tourists. They are located on

Stranmillis Road Stranmillis () is an area in south Belfast, Northern Ireland. It is also an electoral ward for Belfast City Council, part of the Laganbank (District Electoral Area), Laganbank district electoral area. As part of the Queen's Quarter, Belfast, Que ...

Queen's Quarter Queen's Quarter (also known as the University Quarter) is the southernmost quarter in Belfast, Northern Ireland and named after Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland's largest university. The Quarter is centred on the Lanyon Building, the ...

, with

Queen's University Queen's or Queens University may refer to: *Queen's University at Kingston, Ontario, Canada *Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK **Queen's University of Belfast (UK Parliament constituency) (1918–1950) **Queen's University of Belfast ...

nearby. The

Ulster Museum The Ulster Museum, located in the Botanic Gardens in Belfast, has around 8,000 square metres (90,000 sq. ft.) of public display space, featuring material from the collections of fine art and applied art, archaeology, ethnography, treasure ...

is located at the main entrance.

History

The gardens opened in 1828 as the private Royal Belfast Botanical Gardens. It continued as a private park for many years, only opening to members of the public on Sundays prior to 1895. Then it became a public park in 1895 when the Belfast Corporation bought the gardens from the Belfast Botanical and Horticultural Society. The Belfast Corporation was the predecessor of Belfast City Council, the present owner.

The Palm House

The gardens' most notable feature is the Palm House conservatory. The foundation stone was laid by the

Marquess of Donegall Marquess of Donegall is a title in the Peerage of Ireland held by the head of the Chichester family, originally from Devon, England. Sir John Chichester sat as a Member of Parliament and was High Sheriff of Devon in 1557. One of his sons, Sir ...

in 1839 and work was completed in 1840. It is one of the earliest examples of a curvilinear

cast iron Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...

glasshouses in the world. Designed by Charles Lanyon and built by Richard Turner, Belfast's Palm House predates the glasshouses at

Kew Kew () is a district in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames. Its population at the 2011 census was 11,436. Kew is the location of the Royal Botanic Gardens ("Kew Gardens"), now a World Heritage Site, which includes Kew Palace. Kew is a ...

and the Irish National Botanic Gardens at

Glasnevin Glasnevin (, also known as ''Glas Naedhe'', meaning "stream of O'Naeidhe" after a local stream and an ancient chieftain) is a neighbourhood of Dublin, Ireland, situated on the River Tolka. While primarily residential, Glasnevin is also home t ...

, both of which Turner went on to build. The Palm House consists of two wings, the cool wing and the tropical wing. Lanyon altered his original plans to increase the height of the latter wing's dome, allowing for much taller plants. In the past these have included an 11 metre tall globe spear lily. The

lily ''Lilium'' () is a genus of Herbaceous plant, herbaceous flowering plants growing from bulbs, all with large prominent flowers. They are the true lilies. Lilies are a group of flowering plants which are important in culture and literature in mu ...

, which is native to

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

, finally bloomed in March 2005 after a 23-year wait. The Palm House also features a 400-year-old '' Xanthorrhoea''. Image:Plaque in Palm House.jpg, Plaque in three languages Image:Early Spring in Palm House, Botanic Gardens, Belfast.jpg, Early spring flowers Image:Urn, Palm House.JPG, Urn Image:Aloe Saponaria.jpg, ''

Aloe saponaria ''Aloe maculata'' ( syn. ''Aloe saponaria''), the soap aloe or zebra aloe, is a Southern African species of aloe. Local people in South Africa know it informally as the ''Bontaalwyn'' in Afrikaans, or ''lekhala'' in the Sesotho language. Descrip ...

Other features

The gardens contain another glasshouse, the Tropical Ravine House. Built by head gardener Charles McKimm in 1889, it features a unique design. A sunken ravine runs the length of the building, with a balcony at each side for viewing. The most popular attraction is the ''

Dombeya ''Dombeya'' is a flowering plant genus. Traditionally included in the family Sterculiaceae, it is included in the expanded Malvaceae in the APG and most subsequent systematics. These plants are known by a number of vernacular names which sometim ...

'', which flowers every February. The Palm House and the Tropical Ravine House were symbols of Belfast's growing industrial might and prosperity in the

Victorian era In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwardia ...

and attracted over 10,000 visitors a day. The gardens also feature one of the longest

herb In general use, herbs are a widely distributed and widespread group of plants, excluding vegetables and other plants consumed for macronutrients, with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, for medicinal ...

aceous borders in the UK and Ireland. There is also a rose garden built in 1932 and various species of tree, including the hornbeam-

oak An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ''L ...

. A statue of Lord Kelvin stands at the Stranmillis Road entrance. File:Belfast Botanic Gardens glasshouse.jpg, The Palm House File:Botanic Green in Winter, December 2010.jpg, Botanic Green in winter File:Inside Palm House.JPG, Inside the Palm House File:Botanic gardens belfast sign post.JPG, Botanic park sign post File:Lord Kelvin, Botanic park Belfast.jpg, Belfast born

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

Lord Kelvin at the entrance to the Botanic gardens File:Tropical Ravine House, Belfast Sept 2018 10.jpg, Tropical Ravine House in 2018, after refurbishment

Concerts

Concerts and

music festival A music festival is a community event with performances of singing and instrument playing that is often presented with a theme such as musical genre (e.g., rock, blues, folk, jazz, classical music), nationality, locality of musicians, or h ...

s are held at the Stranmillis Embankment end of the gardens. From 2002 to 2006 the Tennents ViTal festival was held in the gardens. Performers included Kings of Leon, Franz Ferdinand, The Coral,

The Streets The Streets are an English music project led by vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Mike Skinner. The project has released six studio albums: ''Original Pirate Material'' (2002), ''A Grand Don't Come for Free'' (2004), ''The Hardest Way to M ...

and The White Stripes. In 2006

Snow Patrol Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish Rock music, rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (musician), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, ...

, The Raconteurs, Editors and Kaiser Chiefs played at the festival. On 26 August 1997 U2 played their first Belfast concert in over a decade as part of the PopMart Tour. 40,000 fans attended, with thousands more lining the perimeter fence and watching from rooftops on Ridgeway Street. Local band

Ash Ash or ashes are the solid remnants of fires. Specifically, ''ash'' refers to all non-aqueous, non- gaseous residues that remain after something burns. In analytical chemistry, to analyse the mineral and metal content of chemical samples, ash ...

and Howard B were the support acts. Celine Dion was due to perform in the Botanic Gardens on 29 May 1999 during her

Let's Talk About Love World Tour The Let's Talk About Love World Tour is the eighth concert tour by Canadian recording artist Celine Dion. Visiting North America, Asia and Europe; the trek supported Dion's fifth English and fifteenth studio album ''Let's Talk About Love'' (1997) ...

, however the show was cancelled along with her performance in Dublin on 27 May 1999.

In popular culture

*While the consumption of alcohol is banned within the park, groups of young people drinking are common during the summer months. The opening scene of Colin Bateman's novel '' Divorcing Jack'' finds the protagonist Dan Starkey with a crate of

Harp Lager ''Harp Lager'' is an Irish lager created in 1959. Formerly produced at the Great Northern Brewery in Dundalk, it is now brewed in Dublin. It is a major lager brand throughout most of Northern Ireland, but is now rarely available in the Republic ...

in the gardens. *The park figures prominently in '' The Fall'', as it is the favorite destination of young Olivia "Livvy" Spector, whose serial killer father, (Peter) Paul Spector, and babysitter Katie both take her there, on different occasions. CCTV captures Spector's presence there on the same Saturday as one of his victims, Sarah Kay, whose sister tells the police the siblings met there weekly. Indeed, by eavesdropping on the sisters' conversation at the park that day (in series 1), Spector learns Sarah Kay has not changed her back door locks, which knowledge he uses to his advantage. And in series 2, when Katie takes Livvy out of school without the Spectors' knowledge or permission, Paul finds them there, on a hunch.

Botanic Station

Frequent trains operated by Northern Ireland Railways run to

Botanic railway station Botanic railway station serves the Botanic area in south Belfast, Northern Ireland and students for Queen's University Belfast; it is also near Shaftesbury Square which is along Botanic Avenue. It is named after the nearby Belfast Botanic Ga ...

References

External links

Belfast Botanic GardensPalm HouseTropical RavineFriends of Belfast Botanic Gardens
{{Authority control Botanical gardens in Northern Ireland Gardens in Belfast Greenhouses in the United Kingdom Register of Parks, Gardens and Demesnes of Special Historic Interest